A Musing on Rewatching the Films We Love

Every now and again a movie hits you deep down in your most vulnerable feelings. Usually, it’s because the film is sad, but sometimes it’s because it’s just so honest, loving, and optimistic in a world that can often be so horrible. For me, Once is that safe space, that movie I can watch again and again and again and I’ll always smile no matter what happened during my day. Sometimes I forget about it for a while and the revisit takes too long but it’s always there when I need it. Watching Once this past week got me thinking: what is it about some movies that we come back to so often? Why, in 2019 when we have an entire universe of cinematic exploration at our mere fingertips, do we keep coming back to the same old classics that we already love? Obviously I watch movies that are new to me—I have to for this blog and podcast. But whenever I need Once or Clerks or The Godfather they are right there on my TV ready for me to press play. So I looked around the internet and as it turns out, I am not the only one asking this question.

In a lot of ways, nostalgia plays a big factor. I can remember being in high school when I first saw Once. I think that it was a birthday gift from a friend, actually, who gave me Garden State that birthday as well. While I still have a bit of a fondness for Zach Braff’s directorial debut (and I LOVED it at the time) it wasn’t as long-lasting as Once. The first time I saw that musical love story I didn’t just love it, I FELT it. And I still do. Being a little lost in high school, as we all are, I took solace in something that was so linear and wholesome. Two people bond over the music that they play when they aren’t at work, then they fall in love, but real life gets in their way and they can’t act out that happy ending. It seemed real to me, it seemed like how life would actually be; no one making a grand gesture to a person that they knew three days and uprooting their whole life for what didn’t even count as a fling. Once wasn’t an escape it was an understanding and it felt like someone was finally being honest with me. Whenever I watch it now I get that same feeling, this time with a little toe-dip into life as an adult. I understand the feelings that the characters have much clearer than I did eleven or so years ago. That feeling of emotional support comes rushing back to me and I smile. There is a good reason why Disney+ is so successful—in fact a lot of Dinsey’s brand is being held up by our collective nostalgia.

There’s also a relatablity and connection in shared misery that is comforting. And when you find that movie you know that it is reliable for those days when that trigger hits. Clerks is a fun one for me. My gateway into Kevin Smith’s View Askiewinverse came through his late 90s satire Dogma and after watching that, I was hooked. I actually rewatch pretty much anything of his that isn’t Chasing Amy at least a couple times per year. And for the longest time Dogma was my absolute favorite of his movies. Then something happened: I became employed by a buy/sell/trade store that sold movies (it is where my cohost and boyfriend Colin and I met, actually) and suddenly Randall’s life working in a video store snapped into the forefront. After enough time helping customers in a few different jobs—movie store associate, waitress, bank teller—I began to realize how these kinds of jobs can turn someone cynical and snarky (and ahem, homicidal) and Clerks began to form an entirely new meaning for me. It was something I related to for so long and now when I give it a rewatch it reminds me why I found a back-office position ASAP while letting me reminisce from a safe place on my couch. The Godfather was the first time that I really felt like I was watching a movie that was serious cinema, that I was understanding, and that I was ENJOYING. In some ways it was my second movie into serious film viewing (The Shining is technically the first, but my taste for that movie has since faded away.) and continued my passion for watching movies beyond just basic entertainment—I began to look at them critically and form an understanding of what a good movie, on a technical level, truly is. That’s a priceless thing in the world of nostalgia—it is the catalyst for a part of my life that brings me so much enjoyment.

There are other, scientific, factors at play as well: the more we watch something the more it grows on us. According to this article I found on The Guardian, we tend to have an easier time processing movies that we have seen before and that allows us to pick up on smaller details and have a more in-depth understanding of the media as a whole. In my own experience, as I mentioned in the cartoon satire episode of the podcast, I find something new every time I rewatch an episode of Bojack Horseman. Like Bojack, some media is packed full of little details in the background and others just have small moments. When it comes to a movie like Once it is so valuable for me to be able to come back to it, especially as an adult finding my way around this world, and notice every small glance they give each other, every moment of bittersweetness; it’s always more interesting to see the themese from an adult perspective. Now that I understand and know the story I can focus on those elements of the movie. The article also points out that habits are at play as well, and I thought about that in my own life. I watched Clerks almost weekly when I was a waitress because I had so many interactions with customers that drove towards insanity and it made me feel better. (There is a good case to be made that many years in the future I will find such solice in Office Space. I thought I loved and got that movie but now…oooof. I REALLY get it.) Eventually I got to the point where my weekly viewing teetered off a bit, but that repetition of a ritual rewatch was still there. As is my quarterly look of at least parts of Coppola’s masterpiece (and don’t you worry, The Godfather, and least Part I, is going to be the subject of an episode two week from now, and Clerks is coming in a couple months). Watching either movie was almost instinctual.

Honestly, whether it is scientific or nostalgic, easy on your brain or fun to find new details, revisiting movies (and TV shows and music) is something that all of us do. As I mentioned before, I absolutely love finding something new and I hope you guys do too, it is why I do this whole project, but I can’t help but slip back into the hilarity of Clerks, the prestige and taste of The Godfather, and especially the warmth and emotions of Once. Everyone has these feelings from the media they love—so just remember there’s no shame in your rewatch game, turn on that old favorite for the literal one-millionth time, and enjoy every smiling second of it.